THE latest line of Tory propaganda in the saga of their chaotic party manoeuvres and contrived distractions from catastrophic governance is that Nicola Sturgeon became First Minister without being elected to that position by the public, so there is no question over the democratic legitimacy of Tory party members effectively selecting as many different Prime Ministers as they desire, even if those PMs totally abandon policies contained in the manifesto on which they were elected to parliament.
Of course, following the lead of the chairman of the “Scottish Conservatives”, list MSP Craig Hoy, others have been prepared to defend the seemingly indefensible by falsely claiming that “this is what all political parties do”, while others have passed verbal or written comments in apparently desperate attempts to draw false equivalence.
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Who in Scotland did not know that Nicola Sturgeon was Alex Salmond’s deputy in the SNP (for more than ten years and through successive election campaigns), and who did not think it was logical for the person who was also Deputy First Minister (for more than seven years) to take over following Mr Salmond’s sudden resignation? (Perhaps those who would argue otherwise can tell us the names of the Tory party deputies of David Cameron, Theresa May, Boris Johnson, Liz Truss, and now, Rishi Sunak?)
The fact that there is no public outcry, never mind a General Election, as the Tory party still arrogantly continue to flout their “election mandate” in such a cavalier manner without any reform of their internal leadership processes, or reform of the process of changing Prime Minister, simply confirms the bleak reality that while the party may not yet be completely over for the Tories, without major constitutional change UK democracy is as dead as the Monty Python stuffed parrot.
Stan Grodynski
Longniddry, East Lothian
I KNEW I’d get at least one call or email along the lines of “you must be so proud, a man of colour: UK PM and he’s Asian”. Deep breath on my part.
My father, born pre-partition in India, saw the harsh reality of colonialism in India, and was part of “Quit India”, followed by “Divide and Quit”. So without a doubt, some visible changes here in the “mother land”. “Visible” doesn’t equate to unpicking and eradicating ingrained societal and institutional racism. This Tory PM is not a politician my father would have welcomed or voted for. And that’s it. “Tory politician”.
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Presumably you join a party believing in their ideology. I mean, that was me when I joined Labour. What an irony since Liz Truss and I now have something in common: we both left a political party having been paid-up members. But that’s about as far as “in common” would go with me and Tory Truss.
But then, could I, should I bond with the PM since he self-defines as “brown” with “Asian” heritage? According to the abbreviations I too am BAME (Black Asian minority ethnic ) and a PoC (person of colour). Give me strength, reduced to an acronym! But it’s his Tory credentials time and time again that should mark him out: belonging to and promoting the party that most recently enforced austerity following on from the last crash.
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Have no doubt that Sunak will now adhere to the same ideology in his desire to “balance the books”. That is his forte, along with creating profits. Those profits tend to flow into hedge funds, financial institutions and offshore accounts whilst the effort (read “sacrifices”) required to achieve the balancing means “us”. We’re the millions, not millionaires, about to see our public services slashed before being picked over by multinational conglomerates. Don’t try to pull the “devolved” card, since we know every cutback that knifes through England and Wales has a knock-on effect via the slicing and dicing of our “Scotland grant”.
Then there’s the looming recession already licking around us, being felt particularly by those living from one pay cheque to the next. Or those of us doing our own balancing: how soon can I go back to the food bank or a hot water bottle, blanket and early bed vs the central heating?
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So, I don’t bond with him politically and I can’t be the only one to wonder if Sunak would have been rejected for a second time if it had gone to a vote by the paid-up members: him versus Penny. Those members are a cross-section of the very people who voted to take back control (of borders) and fix immigration. Is that just me, the cynic? I mean, this PM backed Suella Braverman, backed Priti Patel, backed Brexit and is an inheritor of the nasty party and the roving vans of Home Secretary Theresa May (remember her?). It’s never right to blindly follow, nor to seek some form of comfort in same/similar, especially when it thrives on marginalising and demeaning the “others”. Will there be rejection of racism and xenophobia within his party or will Sunak further advance the hard right-wing, anti-migrant stance that features so large in Tory policies?
It’s paradoxical that he seems to have been won over by “it’s not you, we like you: you don’t talk like them, or dress like them, you’re different, one of us”. But when you’re money-proofed and believe in the infallibility of the party’s ideology, that seems to be sufficient.
No change then from the Tory politics of Westminster. Change is still up to us.
Selma Rahman
Edinburgh
THE National’s front page on Tuesday featured a large picture of the First Minister and a banner headline “Now Let The People Have Their Say”. On page four the First Minister “urged incoming Prime Minister Rishi Sunak to call a General Election.” Would it be possible for the First Minister to please clarify one rather important detail of this election she is continually calling for – is it to be a plebiscite where voting SNP, Alba or Green will count as a referendum Yes vote on independence?
John Baird
Largs
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